The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1887-04-01
Farm.Lire an California.

The great staple product of California
is wheat, of which about fifty million
bushels, worth more than forty millions
of dollars. are raised in good year,
fOur-tifths of which are exported.
The wheat is almost entirely raised on
large ranches by contract. The wheat
grower is no more farmer than he Is
miner or miller. He lets out his
ploughing and seeding by the acre, and
borTOws money from the banks to pay
the bill, giving security on the growing
crop.
In harvest-time the contractor comes
on the ground with his harvesters,
threshers and separators, an outfit cost
ing as much as five thousand dollars.
He brings his own crew of twenty to
twenty-five men, who move about from
place to place, living like gypsies in the
open air. They gather in the broad
fields of grain at the rate of more than
one thousand bushels per day, and
leave the crops neatly piled up in sacks,
to which the rancher has not put his
hand from first to last.
More money is borrowed from the
banks at the rate of one and one-half
per cent. per month to pay for the har-
resting, and some time or any time, be-
:Ore the rainy season begins, the sacks
are carted either to the river or railroad
and sent to market.
The rancher is to all intents and pur-
poses a capitalist, or perhaps, manu-
ufacturcr, dependent upon the capitalist,
and, unless his operations are conduct
ed on sufficiently extensive scale, the
margin of profit is hardly enough to
keep him in idleness during the greater
part of the year.
Every wheat grower in California is
not of this sort, but every well-inform-
ed person will recognize the charac-
teristics of a class sufficiently numer-
Gus to afford a basis for distinct and pc
culiar methods of business, both as re-
CARDS contracts, transportation and q.
nances.
1t is to the thrifty wheat-grower that
the employment of the Chinaman be-
comes necessity if he would vary his
husbandry, and avail himself fully of
the seasons opportunities. In plant
ing, wedding and digging, the China
man excels, and the testimony of
many rancher is that without Chin
ese labor his farming would not be sue
cessful.
In grape culture the common practice
in the state is wasteful. Early in March
the plough is put in among the vines to
remove the weeds that careful culture
would never have permitted to grow.
The weeds come out, and so do all the
tender roots near the surface.
During the summer the vines are
commonly allowed to run until they
cover the ground with shoots from ten
to fifteen feet long; then there is a
spasm of pruning, and they are all cut
back just ut the time when the whole
strength of the foliage is required to
mature the juices in the rapidly swell
ing fruit
The common price for grapes is from
twenty to thirty dollars per ton, acord-
ing to variety and quality, and the
grower has SO little margin for profit
that he can only employ industrious and
steady laborers at small wages.
As consequence, the most success
full grape-gTowers are compelled to EN-
plOy Cinnamon in their vineyards. GEN
orally the more successful the man,
the more Cinnamon he employs; their
wages are from twenty to twenty-five
dollars per month without board.
The employment of the Chinese
becomes more and more Of necessity
on account of the high wages demand
ed by the white laborers. - Youths CoTA-
paaiOa.